Christopher Wilder: The Cross Country Killer

Ask any true crime "fan" who Ted Bundy, Jeffrey Dahmer, The Green River Killer, John Wayne Gacy are and you'll get an answer.  Christopher Wilder, while just as heartless and cruel, is a forgotten killer in the annals of crime.

Born in 1945 to an American naval officer and Australian woman in Sydney, he barely survived his birth (he was reportedly given last rites by a priest) and then nearly drowned in a swimming pool two years later.  At the age of three, a sickly child, he suffered convulsions that led to fainting spells.

Despite his shaky health, his childhood appeared to have been average until his teens.  He started peeking in windows and in 1962, at the age of seventeen, he participated in the gang rape of a teenage girl on the beach in Sydney.  Pleading guilty, Wilder received a year of probation to be combined with counseling and electroshock therapy.  Rather than helping him, it seems the shock therapy fueled his violent fantasies.  He began to foster a need to dominate women and hold them against their will.

At 23, Wilder married but his new bride left him after only week, once she discovered his dark fantasies.  She had also discovered that one of Wilder's passions -- photography -- led him to have photographs of naked women in his briefcase.

In 1969, now divorced, he headed for Florida, settling in Boynton Beach.  The building boom led him to a large economic success, making a fortune in real estate and construction.  He bought himself a nice home, boat, and cars, began racing and developing his photography.  From the outset, Christopher Wilder looked every bit the successful playboy.

In 1971, he landed in hot water again.  This time he was turned in to local authorities for attempts to get various women to pose nude for him.  He received a fine.  He kept his nose clean briefly but he simply couldn't stay out of trouble.  He forced a high school student to perform oral sex on him in a house he was renovating. She turned him in, resulting in him being taken to court.  Wilder told the judge that he was masturbating at least twice a week to the image of raping a girl and did not think what he had done was wrong.   Doctors that examined him believed he was not safe in an unstructured environment and needed supervised treatment.   Efforts to make a deal fell through and the case went to trial.  The jury, somewhat amazingly, acquitted Wilder.

In 1974, Wilder approached two girls in a shopping center and, posing as a photographer, attempted to entice them into a "modeling job" with him.  One girl agreed; he drugged and raped her in his truck.  He was allowed to plea bargain those charges down to probation with therapy.  Claiming he suffered from blackouts, the sex therapist Wilder was required to see believed that he was making progress.

In 1982, on a trip home to  Australia, he was accused of grabbing two 15 year old girls and forcing them to pose nude on a beach.  He bound them into subservient positions and masturbated on them before letting them go.  Wilder's parents posted his hefty bond and Wilder was allowed to return to Florida to await trial.  That trial would be postponed multiple times before the final date was set for April of 1984.

Rosario Gonzalez

On February 26, 1984,  an aspiring model by the name of Rosario Gonzalez vanished.  Rosario was 20, a beautiful girl who was working a temporary job distributing aspirin samples at the Miami Grand Prix racetrack.  Rosario reportedly knew Christopher Wilder and had posed for a book cover with Wilder as the photographer.  Witnesses recounted that she left with an older man around noon.  She never returned; she didn't even pick up her paycheck for the day's work.  Wilder was at the race that day, racing a Porsche 911.

On March 5, 1984, Elizabeth Kenyon vanished.  Beth, 23, a Miss Florida finalist and former Orange Bowl Princess, taught emotionally disturbed students but hoped to return to modeling in the future.  She too knew Christopher Wilder; she had dated him.  She was close to her parents and drove from her home in Coral Gable to theirs in Pompano Beach every weekend.  Her last visit with them would be on March 4, where they had seen a news report on television about the missing Rosario Gonzalez.  The following day, she went to work as usual.  The school's security patrol officer watched her climb into her car and drive away.  He was the last person, save her killer, to see Beth Kenyon.

Elizabeth Kenyon

The Kenyon family hired a private investigator to search for Beth and the investigator found that Beth had recently gone out with three different men - - one being her former boyfriend, Christopher Wilder.  Wilder had even proposed marriage to Beth but she turned him down, feeling their 17 year age difference too much.   As far as Beth knew, they had remained friends.  In fact, she had told her parents on March 4 that Wilder had gotten her several modeling jobs.

Wilder claimed that he had not seen Beth in over a month and the case seemed to stall before two attendants at a local gas station where Beth frequently purchased gas recalled seeing her on March 5.  She was filling up when a man in a gray Cadillac drove up behind her and paid for her gas.  They identified the man as Christopher Wilder.  According to the two witnesses, Beth stated the pair was headed for the airport, although she had not packed nor told anyone she was leaving.  Her car would later be found at the Miami International Airport.

The Kenyons' investigator also spoke with authorities in Boynton Beach and found that Wilder had a lengthy rap sheet for sexual offenses.   The noose was beginning to tighten around Wilder.

March 13, 1984 was his 39th birthday.  On March 16, the Miami Herald reported that a wealthy contractor and racecar driver was suspected in the disappearances of Rosario and Beth.  He kept his appointment with his counselor that day, who asked him if he had anything to do with the disappearances.  He denied it.   On March 18, he dropped off his beloved dogs at a kennel and withdrew close to $50,000 from the bank.   He told his business partner he was being framed and would not go to jail.  Then he climbed into his car, a 1973 Chrysler New Yorker, and took off on a trip that would result in death for many women.

Terry Ferguson

On March 18, 1984, 21 year old Terry Ferguson had gone shopping at a mall close to home in Satellite Beach, roughly two hours from where Wilder had fled.  When Terry didn't return home, her stepfather located her car in the mall parking lot.  About an hour after she had been last seen at the mall, a tow truck was called to a state road by Canaveral Groves to pull a car out of sand.  Wilder, claiming he had gotten lost, had placed the call.  He paid for the tow with his business partner's credit card, which he had stolen.

On March 20, 1984, Wilder had moved on to Tallahassee, where he had grabbed 19 year old Linda Grover.  Like Terry Ferguson, Linda had been shopping close to Florida State when Wilder approached her.  He conned her into accompanying him to his car by telling the pretty blonde he could get her on the cover of Vogue.  Once at his vehicle, he clubbed her and headed north, into Georgia.  He pulled off once to bind her hands and tape her mouth.  At another stop, he placed her in the trunk of his car.  In the town of Bainbridge, Wilder checked into a motel and removed Linda from the trunk, wrapped in a blanket.  Once inside, he glued her eyes shut, shocked her with electrical wires, raped and throttled her.  Linda managed to get into the motel bathroom, where she locked the door and began beating on the walls and screaming, hoping to awaken other guests.  Panicked, Wilder grabbed his belongings and beat a hasty retreat, leaving nothing of himself behind.  Terrified, Linda Grover waited for over half an hour before she would even venture out.  She then wrapped herself in a bedsheet, as her abductor had also taken her clothes, and hurried to the manager's office, where the police were called.

Linda Grover proved to be an excellent witness, as she remembered her kidnapper's car and his appearance perfectly.  As Wilder had used his own Florida driver's license to register at the motel, he was quickly identified.  An APB was put out immediately for both Wilder and his vehicle.

Despite the quick action, Wilder slipped out of Georgia and headed west.

Terry Walden

On March 21, 1984, Terry Walden, a 24 year old nurse, wife and mother from Beaumont, Texas, informed her husband that an older, bearded man had approached her and asked if she would model for him.  He pressed her, asking if she would go to his car to see samples of his work.  She refused and firmly told him to leave her alone.  Two days later, on March 23, Terry vanished.  A friend had seen her around 11:30 that morning, at the student union on campus where she took classes, but Terry was not seen after that.  Her orange Mercury Cougar was also missing from the parking lot.

Also on March 23, a female body was found in a snake-infested canal 70 miles west of Satellite Beach.  It would take dental records to identify it as that of Terry Ferguson.  The local newspaper reported the finding and a witness came forward saying that she had seen Terry talking to an older man the day she disappeared.  Looking through mug shots, and without hesitation, she picked out Christopher Wilder as the man she saw.

Suzanne Logan

On March 25, 1984, Wilder abducted 21 year old Suzanne Logan from the Penn Square Mall in Oklahoma City.  Suzanne's husband, whom she had dropped off at work on her way to the shopping center, reported her missing when she didn't turn up for an appointment or to pick him up.  Suzanne was driven more than 180 miles north into Kansas, where he checked into the I-35 Inn in Newton.  As with Wilder's previous victims, she was tortured and raped.  He also cut her long blonde hair, leaving the locks in the motel room's trashcan.  After breakfast on the  morning of March 26,  Wilder drove to Milford Reservoir, just outside of Junction City, Kansas, where he stabbed Suzanne to death and left her body under a tree.  She would be found an hour after her death; some of her clothing had been removed and her face was badly bruised.  Suzanne wouldn't be identified for a week.

On that same day, March 26, 1984, the body of Terry Walden was discovered floating facedown in a canal.  She was fully dressed, tied with rope and her mouth covered by tape.  She had been stabbed multiple times.  There was no evidence of sexual assault.

Forty detectives were assigned to the case and by this point, the FBI had also entered the search for Wilder.

They found he had stayed at a motel near Beaumont, where Terry Walden went out, and a credit card in Wilder's partner's name was used for payment.  Wilder's abandoned Chrysler, without plates, was found; the assumption was that he was traveling in Terry Walden's Cougar.  They had a description of the car and a plate number but Wilder had a head start.  And they didn't know where he was headed.

Sheryl Bonaventura

On March 29, Wilder was in Grand Junction, Colorado when he spotted 18 year old Sheryl Bonaventura at a mall.  The pretty blonde teen, who had already done some modeling, was chatted up by Wilder and likely an easy mark for him.  Like the others, she was simply gone after speaking with him; her car remained locked and in the parking lot.

Unlike his previous victims, though, Sheryl was seen dining with Wilder in Silverton, where they told staff they were headed to Vegas with a quick stop in Durango.   On March 30, he and Sheryl were seen at the Four Corners Monument before he checked into a motel in Page, Arizona.

On March 31, Wilder was back in Utah, where he shot and stabbed Sheryl Bonaventura to death, leaving her body near the Kanab River.

Michelle Korfman

On April 1, 1984, Wilder arrived in Las Vegas and wasted no time heading to the Meadows Mall, where 17 year old Michelle Korfman was competing in a Seventeen magazine cover model contest.   Another photographer caught a photo of Wilder watching Michelle intently, with a broad smile on his face.  Witnesses would recall Michelle leaving with him, as well as Wilder approaching other women throughout the day with his modeling propositions.  Some of those he approached had agreed to meet him later in front of Caesar's Palace; he never showed.  Michelle's car was found in the center parking lot but Michelle was gone.

It's not known exactly when he killed Michelle Korfman but he disposed of her body near a rest stop by the Angeles National Forest in southern California.

On April 4, 1982, Wilder noticed 16 year old Tina Risico at a shopping mall in Torrance.  Tina had  just filled out a job application at Hickory Farms and he approached her as she left the store.  He told her he was scouting for models for a billboard and offered her $100 if she would pose for him.   She agreed and accompanied him away from the mall for her "test shots."  He took some photos before she told him she had to go home, at which time he became angry and pulled a gun on her.  He bound her, put her in Terry Walden's car, which he was still driving, and headed south to El Centro, just outside of San Diego and not far from the Mexican border.   He had already acquired a motel room, where he took Tina, tied her to the bed and assaulted her.  Unlike the unfortunate females before her, however, Wilder did not kill her.  A problematic childhood and sexual assault had left Tina more robotic after Wilder's assault, giving him no hysteria and panic to feed on.  It's possible he may also have considered that the young girl could help him to acquire other victims.

Tina was reported missing almost immediately.  The manager at the Hickory Farms in Torrance had seen Wilder loitering outside the store while she was inside; the manager identified Christopher Wilder from a mug shot.

By now, Wilder's image and dirty deeds were being reported on television and in the newspapers and the FBI had added him to their Ten Most Wanted list.  Knowing he had to get out of California, he headed east.  The two drove through Prescott, Arizona; Taos, New Mexico; Joplin, Missouri; and Chicago, Illinois.  In Merrillville, Indiana, he would spot his next victim.

Dawnette Wilt

Dawnette Wilt, like Tina Risico, was 16 years old and filling out a store application at the Southlake Mall when Tina approached her and, identifying herself as "Tina Marie Wilder," asked her to step outside the store to speak to the manager.  Wilder was waiting with his gun; he forced Dawnette into the car where, after putting tape on her eyes and mouth, he repeatedly assaulted her in the backseat while Tina drove east.   The trio would stop in Ohio for the night, where Wilder would terrorize Dawnette further, before driving across Pennsylvania and into New York the next day, stopping at Niagara Falls.  That night, Dawnette was once again repeatedly assaulted and both girls were threatened with death if they attempted to escape or make a sound.

It was while they were staying in the Niagara Falls area that Wilder saw a televised plea from Tina's mother for her daughter's safe return.  He bundled both his hostages in the car and directed Tina to drive to Penn Yan, stopping outside some woods.  He marched Dawnette into the woods, where he attempted to suffocate her but the girl struggled too much.  He then stabbed her once in the front and once in the back.  She pretended to be dead while he returned to the car and had Tina drive away.  Once she knew he was gone, she dragged herself to the roadside where a passing motorist saw her and called for help.

Dawnette Wilt told the police that Wilder was headed for the Canadian border in Terry Walden's car and had told her and Tina that he would not be taken alive.

Beth Dodge

Christopher Wilder, as always, was still hunting for victims.  On April 12, 1984 at Eastview Mall in Victor, New York, he laid eyes on 33 year old Beth Dodge, who was getting out of a gold Pontiac Trans-Am.  He had Tina persuade the woman to come over to their car, where he took her keys and forced her inside the Cougar.  He had Tina follow him in Beth Dodge's Trans-Am.

After a short drive, Wilder pulled in to a deserted gravel pit, where he had Beth get out of the vehicle and then shot her twice in the back.  The Mercury Cougar was then abandoned, with Wilder and Tina leaving the scene in Beth's car.

Wilder directed Tina to drive to Boston - - Logan Airport, more specifically where he told his captive that he was going to send her home.  After nine harrowing days, he bought Tina a ticket to Los Angeles and set her free.  So traumatized was the teen, she waited for him to shoot her in the back as she walked away to board the plane.  She told no one at the airport or on the plane of her ordeal. When she landed in L.A., she caught a cab to a boutique, where she purchased lingerie with money Wilder gave her.  She told the clerk that Wilder had cut her hair to resemble Jennifer Beals, the star of Flashdance.  She was spotted by friends, who took her to the police.  She told the police that Wilder had expressed a desire that she not be with him when he died.

Wilder, meanwhile, seemed to know that his time was running out.  After dropping off Tina Risico, he once again headed north toward Canada.

On Friday, April 13, Wilder attempted to grab another victim when he saw a 19 year old whose car had broken down on the side of the road.  He offered to give her a lift to a service station; when he began passing available service stations, she quickly realized what was up, threw open the door and leapt out of the car.  After she escaped, he threw out all of his belongings, including his camera and items of his victims' he had kept.  Then he drove into New Hampshire.

It was in Colebrook, about 12 miles from the Canadian border, that two state troopers spotted him at a service station.  They either recognized the car from BOLOs or Wilder's supposed erratic behavior.  His tan definitely indicated he was not from the area.  Although he had shaved off his beard, the troopers believed he resembled the FBI's wanted posters and so they pulled in.

New York Times article with photo of Wilder in death

When the troopers called out to him, Wilder dove into the Trans-Am, reaching for the .357 Magnum he kept handy.  A scuffle ensued with two shots ringing out.  Trooper Leo Jellison, who had jumped on Wilder's back, attempting to obtain the weapon, was hit as the first bullet passed through Wilder's body and into Jellison's chest.  The second shot decimated Christopher Wilder's heart, killing him instantly.  Leo Jellison would survive and recover.

Forty-seven days after Rosario Gonzalez disappeared and twenty-six days after his cross country spree began, it was over.

Found in Wilder's possessions when he died was the .357 Magnum, which would kill him, rolls of duct tape, handcuffs, rope, the electrical cord he had designed to shock his victims, a sleeping bag, his business partner's credit card and a copy of the 1963 book The Collector.  Written by John Fowles, it tells the story of a man who captures and imprisons a pretty young girl, keeping her in his basement and believing that because he treats her well, he will eventually win her love and loyalty.  Wilder had been so obsessed with The Collector, he had practically memorized in in its entirety.

Christopher Wilder's body was returned to Florida, where it was cremated.  Many questions remained though.  Did Wilder commit suicide?  Was he trying to escape?  Where were his victims that had not been found?  And how many victims did he truly take?

On May 3, 1984, the body of Sheryl Bonaventura was discovered under a tree in Utah.

On May 11, 1984, the body of Michelle Korfman was discovered.  She was so badly decomposed that it took a month to make a firm identification.

At his death, Wilder left an estimate reported to be somewhere between $2 and $7 million.  In 1986, a court appointed arbitrator ruled that the balance of the estate, after taxes, was to be divided between the families of his victims.

Rosario Gonzalez and Beth Kenyon have never been found.

Marianne and Christine

Over the years, Wilder's name has been connected to cases of other missing and murdered women.  It's impossible to say how many disappearances and homicides he's responsible for but it's entirely likely that he could have begun killing before February of 1984.

On January 11, 1965, Marianne Schmidt and Christine Sharrock, both 15, were murdered at Wanda Beach in Sydney, Australia.  They were discovered the following day, partially buried in the sand.  The girls had been bludgeoned, stabbed and slashed and their killer had cut their clothing and attempted to rape both.  These murders came just over two years after Wilder had been charged in the gang rape.  He was one of three potential suspects in the killings and he closely resembled the sketch of the suspect.  The murders remain officially unsolved.

Mary Opitz

On January 16, 1981, 17 year old Mary Opitz went to the Edison Mall in Fort Myers, Florida with her mother and brother.  Growing tired, she had grabbed a bag of pretzels and headed to the parking lot, to wait in the car for her family.  Roughly an hour later, her mother returned to the car to discover packages Mary had been carrying, and the bag of pretzels, sitting on the trunk.   Police initially believed Mary to be a runaway, although her family disputed this from the beginning.

On February 11, 1981, Mary Elizabeth Hare, an 18 year old who eerily resembled Mary Opitz, disappeared from the same parking lot at the Edison Mall.  Like the case of Mary Opitz, no clues were left behind.  Mary Elizabeth Hare's car was undisturbed.

In June of 1981, Mary Elizabeth Hare's body was located in a field in a relatively undeveloped area of Lehigh Acres, Florida.  She was fully clothed and had been stabbed in the back.

The murder of Mary Elizabeth Hare remains unsolved and Mary Opitz is still missing.

In May of 1982, two sets of skeletal remains were unearthed in Loxahatchee, Florida.  The bodies, both females, were found close to property that Wilder owned in Palm Beach County.  One woman had been dead for several months at the time of discovery.  The other victim, found in a green nylon bag, had been dead for anywhere from one to three years and her fingertips were missing -- sliced off by her killer in a probable attempt to keep her from being identified.  It would take just over 30 years but in July of 2013, she was identified as 17 year old Tina Marie Beebe.

Shari Lynne Ball

On June 27, 1983, 20 year old Shari Lynne Ball left her home in Boca Raton, Florida, telling her mother she was going to New York to model.  Two days later, she called her boyfriend to say she was in Virginia.  That was the last contact Shari had with her friends and family.  On October 29, 1983 a decomposed female body, partially sunk in swamp water, was discovered in Shelby, New York.  No identification was found and cause of death could not be determined.  She was buried as a Jane Doe.  In 2014, after the body was exhumed to be tested against other missing woman, it was finally identified as Shari Lynne Ball.

Tammy Lynn Leppert

On July 6, 1983, 18 year old Tammy Lynn Leppert disappeared some time after 11:30 a.m. from Cocoa Beach, Florida, after getting into a heated argument with a male friend.  Tammy was already an established model and an actress, having appeared in such films as Little Darlings, Scarface, and Spring Break.  It was after shooting of Spring Break had concluded and she had gone to a weekend party by herself that she returned home "different."  She left the set of Scarface unexpectedly after four days and was reportedly fearful for her life in the days leading up to her disappearance, as well as possibly pregnant.  Tammy's mother, a modeling agent, filed a wrongful death suit against Wilder before his death; she later dropped the case, citing that she never truly believed her daughter was Wilder's victim.  Tammy has never been found and remains missing.

Broward County Jane Doe

On February 18, 1984, the body of a young woman was found face-down in a canal in Broward County, Florida.  She was somewhere between the ages of 18 and 35, had curly blonde or strawberry blonde hair, hazel eyes and a gap between her front teeth.  It was estimated she was strangled to death around February 16, 1984.  She remains unidentified today, known only as "Broward County Jane Doe."

Colleen Orsborn

On March 15, 1984, 15 year old Colleen Orsborn left her Daytona Beach home and vanished.  Wilder was staying in a motel in Daytona Beach on the same day.  Despite intense searches, Colleen could not be located.  In 2001, Colleen's brother received an anonymous letter detailing where her body could be found.  The letter was postmarked from Manchester, N.H.  No body was found where instructed and the lead turned out to be a dead end.  In 2007, there was a DNA match on a body that had been discovered in April of 1984 in Orange County, Florida.  The body, which had been partially buried near a lake, had been unidentified for more than thirty years before it was determined that Colleen had been found.

Wilder, at the Meadows Mall in Las Vegas, immediately prior to abducting Michelle Korfman

After Wilder had gone on the run, some of his employees in Florida came forward to say that he was the best boss they ever had - - a nice, understanding man who always paid his employees on time and what they were worth.  It's hard to marry the image of a kind, generous business owner with a vicious rapist, torturer and murderer but it appears that Christopher Wilder had two sides to his personality.  Even Beth Kenyon, who went missing in March of 1984, after dating Wilder and turning down his marriage proposal, had told her parents that he was a real gentleman.

Christopher Wilder, unlike other killers, including Ted Bundy, did not have the same sense of self-preservation.  Many, including Officer Leo Jellison who attempted to apprehend Wilder and was shot in the process, believe that the killer took his own life rather than face prison time and/or the death penalty.  Others believe that Wilder was going for the gun to shoot his way out of the situation and would have fled.  Tina Risico's statements seems to indicate that Wilder knew his freedom was coming to an end and he was going to choose how he would end his story.  Controlling to the very last.

His death, while sparing many from a public trial in which their daughters and loved ones' last moments would be painfully rehashed, also kept other families from knowing where their daughters were.   Had Wilder been taken alive, would he have talked?  I think it's possible that he would have been like Bundy, discussing his crimes, if at all, in a vague third person account before possibly disclosing details only when his own life hung in the balance.

Christopher Wilder is an enigma.  Like Ted Bundy, he was attractive to women, charming, intelligent, and successful.  He managed to sweet talk his victims exactly where he wanted them; appearing well-dressed and congenial, like Bundy, they trusted him until the monster awoke.

Wilder traveled great distances; although Bundy did so to widen his victim pool, Wilder took to the road because he knew authorities were on his trail.

He seemed to have multiple methods of death -- he would bludgeon, strangle, shoot, and stab -- although his victim type rarely waivered.  Some of his victims were taken due to proximity, opportunity and appearance; some, like Beth Dodge, merely as a means to an end (in her case, for her vehicle.)

Unlike Bundy, who once he had a victim firmly in his grasp, under his control and assaulted, he never intentionally let go, Christopher Wilder not only kept one -- Tina Risico -- alive but gave her spending money and put her on a plane back home.  Why?  Why demonstrate near compassion for one victim and show only cold, cruel brutality to others?  Was it her non-reaction to his assaults and promises of being killed?  Or did he see something in Tina that he recognized in himself?  A painful childhood or a question of where to fit in and belong?  Only Wilder could know, if he was even capable of recognizing it.

Did something happen to Wilder when he was forced to undergo shock treatments, which merged sexual desire and violence?  Did it start much earlier -- when he was having convulsions at three or a near drowning at two?  Or was he simply born void of conscience?

Headlines after Wilder's death; the male figure in the far left of the picture was Wilder

Photo:  Murderpedia

The Murder Spree of Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate

In recent years Hollywood has glamorized and romanticized Charles Starkweather and his rampage that took 11 lives at the end of 1957 and beginning of 1958, with cinematic depictions in Badlands, Natural Born Killers and Kalifornia.  Rather than being some kind of hero, as the fictional film portrayals suggest, Starkweather was nothing but a cold and cruel murderer.

He was born into a working class family in Nebraska, the third of seven children.  He had been born with a slight birth defect that caused his legs to be misshapen and, as a schoolchild, suffered with a speech impediment.  Being teased and bullied by other children, both due to his legs and his speech impediment, caused him to harbor a tremendous amount of rage which he eventually began to unleash on those he didn't like.  Coming  from a working class family, along with his diminutive size, led to an intense envy and hatred for those who had what he wanted and felt was his due.

Charlie dropped out of school during his senior year in high school and gained employment at a warehouse near Whittier Junior High School, where his new girlfriend went to school.  Caril Ann Fugate was thirteen; a petite and pretty girl, her older sister had been the girlfriend of one of Charlie's friends.  Caril Ann inadvertently led to Starkweather's being banished from his family home after she crashed his vehicle into another.  Charlie's father, the legal owner of the car, had to pay the damages and an altercation between the two erupted, ending with father kicking son out of the house.   Charlie quit his warehouse job in favor of employment as a garbage collector; his new job would give him the opportunity to scout out homes for robberies.  It was also during this time that he decided he wanted to be a criminal and that dead people were all on the same level.  He began to yell "go to hell," and other obscenities at strangers and persons he encountered on his garbage route.

Starkweather considered himself a brother of sorts to James Dean, a rebel without a cause -- although his personal cause was to create fear in others and alleviate his always smoldering anger.  He took to wearing a black motorcycle jacket, black and white cowboy boots and covering his naturally red hair with black shoe polish.

Robert Colvert

Photo:  Murderpedia

On November 30 - December 1, 1957, his antisocial behavior turned murderous.  Robert Colvert was 21 years old, recently discharged from the U.S. Navy.  Bobby had married his high school sweetheart a year earlier and the two were expecting their first child.  He worked nights at the Crest Service Station in Lincoln, pumping gas.  He was later described as a loving and caring man who, like his father, enjoyed carpentry.  He was easygoing and quick to laugh.  Unfortunately he crossed paths with a brewing killer.

Starkweather had gone to the Crest Service Station looking to buy a stuffed animal for Caril on credit.  Bobby had refused him.  Enraged, Charlie left but returned around 3 a.m. with a shotgun.  He demanded money from the register - - nearly $90 in bills and $10 in loose change - - and then abducted Bobby Colvert.  Starkweather drove him to a spot on Superior Street where some type of squabble occurred.  Bobby, likely figuring that Starkweather would not leave him alive, had fought for his life and was injured in the process.  It was then that Starkweather put the shotgun to Bobby Colvert's head and pulled the trigger.

Later on that Sunday, December 1, while Bobby lay in the field where he died, Charlie Starkweather went to a thrift shop where he bought shoes,  a jacket, shirts, undershirts, and jockey shorts.  He paid for them with the $10 in loose change he had scored from his robbery.  Rather than being scared by his slide into murder, Starkweather felt empowered.  He believed he had a new existence, a new reason for being, and that he could kill with impunity.  Perhaps coincidentally, his first murder and decision that killing was his reason for being happened the same week he turned nineteen.  He also confessed to Caril that he was the perpetrator of the robbery.

Police initially suspected that Bobby Colvert had been killed by a transient and, as a result, their investigation into his murder was minimal.

On December 12, 1957, after a service at the United Methodist Church, Bobby was laid to rest at Beaver Crossing Cemetery.

From left: Velma and Marion Bartlett; Betty Jean Bartlett

Charles Starkweather's high from his first murder would last until January of 1958, when he lost his job.  On Tuesday, January 21, he went to Caril Ann's home, reportedly looking for her.  (She was at school.)   Caril's stepfather, Marion Bartlett, 57, and mother, Velda Bartlett, 36, were home with their 2 year old daughter, Betty Jean.  Neither parent cared for the moody and malevolent Charles Starkweather and ordered him to stay away from Caril.

Later on, Caril would claim she had broken up with Starkweather on Sunday, January 19.  She would also claim that her family was dead when she arrived home and Starkweather, after telling her they were being held for hostage, told Caril herself she would be killed if she were not cooperative.

Marion Bartlett was shot in the head.  Velda Bartlett was shot in the face and bludgeoned with the rifle.  There is a dispute as to exactly when Betty Jean was killed.  Some say she was initially spared but her crying got on the nerves of both Starkweather and Fugate; Starkweather threw a knife at her, which struck and killed her.  Others say that Starkweather bludgeoned, strangled and stabbed Betty Jean before Fugate returned to the home.  Regardless of the death order, all three bodies were placed in outbuildings around the home -- Marion in the chicken coop, Velda in the outhouse and Betty Jean with some trash.

August Meyer as a young man

Photo:  FindaGrave.com

The teenage couple would then live in the house for the next six days, living like "kings," according to Starkweather.  The proximity of three dead bodies seemed not to concern them.   Caril turned away visitors and concerned family members, including her grandmother, sister and brother-in-law, and even Charlie's own brother, by claiming the entire family was sick with the flu.  She left a note on the door stating as much, signing it as "Miss Bartlett" and underlining it twice.  She would later claim this was a signal for help, as the only true "Miss Bartlett" in the home was her 2 year old half-sister.

It was only when Caril's grandmother threatened to call the police that Starkweather and Fugate decided to leave.  In Charlie's car, the two drove fifteen miles out of Lincoln to the small town of Bennet where a Starkweather family friend by the name of August Meyer lived.  Starkweather's car got stuck in the mud and he and Fugate headed to the farmhouse on foot.

August Meyer was a lifelong bachelor, a quiet and gentle man who lived simply as a farmer.  He offered his horses to assist Starkweather in pulling his car out of the mud and it was while the teenagers were following the 70 year old man to the barn that Starkweather shot and killed August Meyer and then beat Meyer's dog to death.  The beating caused the shotgun to break.

Fugate would later say the brutality of August Meyer's death and the beating of his dog convinced her that her only option was to obey Charles Starkweather.

Carol King and Robert Jensen

Later that same night of January 27, 1958, a kind and unsuspecting couple picked up Starkweather and Fugate, who were walking.  That couple was Robert Jensen, 17, and Carol King, 16.  Starkweather was at first charming but once he got in the couple's car, with Fugate in tow, he turned vicious.  He ordered Jensen to drive to an abandoned storm cellar in Bennet and the couple were forced from the car and into the cellar.  Robert Jensen was shot in the back of the head six times by Starkweather, who then turned his attention to Carol King.  An attempt at rape was unsuccessful.  She was shot once in the head before being stabbed in the abdomen and pubic area.  Starkweather would later claim that while he killed Jensen, it was Fugate who, in a jealous rage over seeing Starkweather's attention to the pretty King, killed her.  Fugate claimed she stayed in the car while Starkweather did all the killing.

C. Lauer Ward

Photo:  Lincoln Journal Star

 Starkweather and Fugate left Bennet in Robert Jensen's vehicle and headed back to Lincoln.  The plan was to find a suitable house in which to hide out.  It was now January 28, 1958.  The home of C. Lauer Ward, a wealthy industrialist, in the Country Club area of Lincoln, was chosen by Caril.  Lauer Ward and his wife Clara were the parents of Michael, who was away at school.  Like Caril Ann Fugate, he was just 14 years old.

Clara Ward

Photo:  Murderpedia

Starkweather and Fugate tied up Clara Ward, 46, as well as her deaf maid, Lilyan Fencl, 51.  They took turns sleeping, so their prey would remain guarded.  At some point, Clara Ward and Lilyan Fencl were killed.  Clara was stabbed in the neck and chest; Lilyan was tied to a bed and stabbed.  When Lauer Ward, 47, returned home, he was shot to death.   They became the eighth, ninth, and tenth victims.

Before leaving Lincoln in the Wards' 1956 Packard and with stolen jewelry from the house, Starkweather snapped the neck of the family dog.

He would later claim that while he threw a knife at Lilyan Fencl, it was Caril who had inflicted multiple stab wounds on the woman, killing her.

The plan had been to head for Washington state, where Starkweather's brother lived.

Lilyan Fencl

Photo:  Murderpedia

The discovery of the Wards' bodies and that of Lilyan Fencl created outrage in the community.  Law enforcement agencies throughout the region banded together, performing house by house searches, looking for the perpetrators.  When that failed to find any suspects, block by block searches of the city went underway.  Several citizens reported sightings of Starkweather and Fugate.

Starkweather realized that the Wards' Packard was hot and, some ten hours after fleeing Lincoln, began looking for a replacement car.  Traveling salesman Merle Collison, 37  and from Great Falls, Montana, was discovered sleeping in his Buick outside of Douglas, Wyoming.  Starkweather tapped on the window, awakening him, and demanded he leave the vehicle, firing a shot into a side window, before unloading on the man.

Starkweather would later claim that his gun jammed and it was Caril that issued the kill shots to Merle Collison, some nine in total.  

Merle Collison

Photo:  Lincoln Journal Star

Starkweather stalled Collison's Buick and attempted to restart the engine.  Passing motorist Joe Sprinkle, seeing the two cars stopped, pulled over to help.  Starkweather, confused by the new parking brake that came equipped on Collison's Buick, asked Sprinkle for assistance.  Sprinkle noticed Collison's body stuffed under the dashboard and was confronted with Starkweather's gun.  Larger by Starkweather by a good half foot, Sprinkle decided to put up a fight and managed to wrestle the gun away from the teenage killer.

It was then that Natrona County Deputy Sheriff William Romer came up on the scene.  As Romer exited his vehicle, Caril jumped out of Collison's car and ran toward the lawman, screaming, "He's going to kill me!  He's crazy!  He just killed a man!"

Starkweather, now unarmed, jumped into the Wards' Packard and headed back toward Douglas.   Romer, upon being told by Fugate that the escaping man was Charles Starkweather, stayed behind and radioed for help.  A roadblock was immediately set up at the Douglas city limits; Starkweather blew through it, leading authorities on a 100-mph chase through the streets of Douglas.  Officers fired shots at Starkweather's vehicle, finally striking it just east of town.  With the back window shattered, Starkweather slammed on the brakes of the Packard, coming to a screeching halt.  He sat that way for a few stressful moments, while the officers issued threats and fired more shots, before giving up.

Flying glass from the shattered back window had nicked Starkweather's ear and right hand, leading him to believe he had been shot.  The cold, indifferent killer who had no value for the lives of others apparently valued his own enough to surrender when death confronted him.

He would later state he gave up because he was out of ammunition.

The next day, January 29, 1958, Charles Starkweather appeared before a Wyoming justice of the peace to be charged with Merle Collison's murder.  Governor Milward Simpson had already publicly stated that were Starkweather to be convicted and sentenced to death by a Wyoming jury, he would commute his sentence.  Simpson was stalwartly opposed to the death penalty.  Faced with what they considered a dilemma, the Wyoming D.A. let it be known that he would defer to Nebraska prosecutors.  Even Simpson, as anti-death penalty as he was, agreed to sign extradition papers for Starkweather to be returned to Nebraska, a state that had no such issue with the death penalty.


On January 31, 1958, Starkweather was returned to Nebraska to face trial, which began in May.  Against his wishes, his attorneys offered an insanity defense.  The jury, however, didn't buy it and on May 23, 1958 he was found guilty and sentenced to death for the murder of Robert Jensen.

Caril Ann Fugate's journey through the legal system wouldn't be as straightforward.  Nervous, upset and said to be in a state of shock at the time of her surrender, she was sedated at the jail in Douglas.  The following morning, she cried for her mother and wondered why she wasn't allowed to call her parents.  Converse County Sheriff Earl Heflin, who had been one of the lawmen to fire shots at Starkweather and whose shot had shattered the back window of the Packard, initially believed that Caril had no idea her family was dead.  On Friday, January 31, the same day Charlie was sent back to Nebraska, she was told her family had been killed and she was reported to have broken down.

Starkweather told law enforcement at this stage that Caril was a hostage and had nothing to do with the crime spree.  Natrona County Sheriff William Romer -- the man Caril surrendered to -- disputed this.  He stated that Caril had admitted to him that she knew her family was dead and had watched them die.  The sheriff of Converse County, Earl Heflin, backed up these claims by saying that when she was finally taken into custody, Caril had clippings in her pocket of her family's murders.   Nebraska prosecutors responded by charging her with murder.

By the time Caril went to trial, Starkweather had changed his story, now claiming that she was an active participant in the killings and had personally murdered some of the victims herself.    When her trial started in November of 1958, she became the youngest female in U.S. history to be charged with first degree murder.

Starkweather was brought from prison to testify against his former girlfriend.  Despite Caril's claims that she was an innocent victim, neither the judge overseeing her trial nor the jury believed her.  Caril was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison on November 21, 1958.

At 12:04 a.m. on June 25, 1959, Charles Starkweather was executed in the Nebraska electric chair.  He went to his death believing that if he deserved to die, so too did Caril.

Starkweather was buried in Wyuka Cemetery in Lincoln.  Five of his victims -- Marion Bartlett, Velda Bartlett, Betty Jean Bartlett, Lauer Ward and Clara Ward -- also count Wyuka Cemetery as their final resting place.

Caril in prison

While incarcerated, Caril Ann Fugate was considered a model prisoner.  She was paroled in 1976, after serving nearly eighteen years and left Nebraska for Michigan.  She worked as a janitorial assistant and chose to live quietly.  With the exception of a 1996 radio appearance she made after the state refused to pardon her, she did not speak of the events of 1958.  Sheriff William Romer continued to believe in her active participation and guilt in the crime spree.  He recalled that once in custody, Caril had told him that she and Charlie made up a story to make her look good, to evade punishment.  They even "planted" rope burns on her wrists, by tying her up and rubbing the ropes good, so she would look as if she had been restrained.

She married in 2007 and was widowed in 2013 when she and her husband were involved in a single vehicle accident.  She survived but suffered serious injuries.

In 2012, a copy of an investigative file on the Starkweather case was unearthed.  Belonging to Robert G. Anderson, a Lancaster County deputy sheriff in Nebraska, the file indicated that Starkweather and Fugate had come to a service station near Roca, Nebraska on January 27, 1958 around 1 p.m.   While Starkweather had been conversing with the mechanics about repairing a tire, Fugate had sat in the attached diner, waiting for her order of four hamburgers.  According to the waitress, the teen watched her intently but never indicated she had been kidnapped or was in any distress.  The waitress recalled that during the fifteen or so minutes Caril Ann Fugate sat at the diner counter, there were at least three men that were also sitting at the counter.  She said nothing to any of them; she only watched the waitress intently.  That morning, August Meyer had been murdered and after Starkweather and Fugate left, Robert Jensen and Carol King would become victims.

The Starkweather-Fugate killing spree was the first of its kind in the new era brought about by television.  Reporters and journalists flooded Wyoming and Nebraska, broadcasting to its viewers the horrible details of the violence Starkweather left in his wake.  With the help of these news broadcasts, Nebraska and its surrounding regions lived in a state of fear for the week or so Starkweather was loose.

Unlike many other murderers, Charles Starkweather wasn't particularly interesting, nor was he an enigma.  He wasn't particularly smart; he felt inferior to many people as evidenced by his courting of a thirteen year old girl.  He killed out of anger brought on by that inferiority and envy.  He despised those he targeted for their comfort, their normality but he also wanted that for himself.   He wanted to be seen as a tough guy but the first time he lost control, he gave in.  In the end, he was nothing more than a bully who enjoyed inflicting pain on others.

Caril Ann Fugate's part in the crimes was much more complex.  She was barely fourteen when the deadly rampage started and had been involved for months with the manipulative Starkweather.  She could have left Lincoln with him as a desperate means to stay alive, after watching him slaughter her family, as she asserted.  But she also could have been a willing participant, so long as they evaded arrest.

She claims she broke up with Starkweather on January 19, 1958.  He killed Bobby Colvert on the night of November 30 - December 1, 1957.  She claims she only knew about Starkweather robbing the service station but Colvert's murder would certainly have been in the newspapers and it would have been spoken about around town.  Why didn't she immediately break it off with him?  Why didn't she go to authorities then?  Ten lives would have been saved if she had.

The biggest question for me with regard to Caril is why she didn't flee when she had the opportunity.  According to her, she waited in the car while Charlie took Robert Jensen and Carol King to the abandoned storm cellar in Bennet to execute them.  She was left alone.  If he left the keys in the car, why didn't she take off?  Even without the keys, why didn't she run on foot?  On their return to Lincoln, they slept in shifts throughout the day in the Ward house.  Why didn't she run then, while he was asleep?

Did she play any part in the murders, other than Bobby Colvert's?  She says she did not but there was and is no one else alive to confirm or deny her statements.  Charlie Starkweather at first said that Caril was innocent in the crimes and then changed his story.  Not uncommon for a killer.  He admitted to those murders he did commit so was he telling the truth about the part Caril played?

The guilt or innocence of Caril Ann Fugate divided Nebraska, and the country, in 1958 and continues to be divisive today.  Even while incarcerated, she had a loyal and strong group of supporters who believed she had been a living victim of Charles Starkweather, that she had been young and impressionable and rallied for her parole.  There were also those, including the judge and jury in her trial, who did not believe she was a hostage and was fully complicit in the killings.

What do you think?  Was Caril Ann Fugate a victim of Charles Starkweather or a victimizer? Was her sentence just?